10-18-17 - Swamp Ducks and Field Geese

Part 1 - Ducks
It's always hard to get up early and drive long distances for hunting, but when the NW boys give you the green light to hunt with them I always find it a little easier to get up. This morning was no different as the alarm sounded off at 0330 except I knocked over my glass of water trying to shut the dang thing off which royally pissed me off. I quickly got dressed and had most of my hunting gear previously loaded in the car so I was headed to NW CT around 0350. I met DU CT at his house and we quickly jumped in his already loaded truck and headed to the TOP Secret location to meet "The WoodsmanA" and Alex. With the temp at around 41 degrees and me not having much on, I decided to walk in with my waders. Now for those of you that don't know me that well, I've just begun to get into water fowling and i'll tell you right now I am not used to walking in waders. After the half mile walk through thick laurel, I was sweating profusely and had tripped over every stump in the woods. Anyways, we finally made it to the spot and quickly got into an old canoe and kayak to paddle out into this beautiful hidden swamp. We dropped DU CT and Alex off on an old beaver dam and they set out a few decoys while me and WoodsmanA headed to a different area not too far away. We also put out decoys and got set up real nice and cozy in the bushes several yards from each other. As it got near legal shooting time, you could hear the wood ducks all around in the water, in the trees, and screaming by. We could also hear several mallards in the swamp as well. Not long after shooting light the first group of 4 or so came by and were a little high so we all blasted a few shots and got one. The next group came in shortly after and we managed two more woodies. After a while, we realized that the cold weather had undoubtedly pushed many of the birds from this area and down further south. From talking to the boys the area was covered up in birds several days ago, but they seemed to talk like the hunt was kind of slow. It didn't matter because I was having a blast. After a little while with no birds DU CT sent Alex off on the yak to spook some birds and while doing so, he managed to push one our way and DU CT whacked him. Alex was also able to capitalize on a kill while in the kayak in the back of the swamp. It wasn't long until DU CT said we need to hurry up and leave. Now i'm sitting here thinking it's awfully early to be leaving, but boy I had no clue what was in store. So, we jumped in our yak and canoe, gathered the dead birds and decoys and quickly headed out. I could tell the guys were in a hurry so I asked what's up? It was then I realized we were about to go to a cut corn field to try for geese before it was too late in the morning

Part II - Geese
We jumped in the trucks from our duck hunting spot at a little after 0715 and headed out to a cut corn field on a farm that the boys have permission to hunt. When we got there, the decoys were already waiting for us behind the blind that they had built at the beginning of the season, so we quickly went to set those out. About half way through setting them out one of the boys yelled "i hear geese", so we all sprinted to the blind and threw the bags and remaining decoys in the bushes. Sure enough there was a group that flew by but never came in. So, quickly back out to the field to set up the remaining decoys. I swear I don't believe we even got one set out before another group of geese were honking. Back to sprinting and running to the blind. We all dove in the blind after throwing the decoys and bags all in the bushes. Fortunately for us this group landed right in the decoys. After hearing the sweet words "take em boys", we had 3 down. Not five minutes later another big group comes in and we pounded them killing seven. At the time we had no clue what we'd done so we ran out to count and make sure we were still under the limit of 12 geese (3*4 people). It was unbelievable. We literally had 10 geese down in less than 10 minutes. That must have been the last group to feed for the morning because it got slow and we couldn't get any others to come in. We left shortly after 0900 and checked out a few more fields with no luck. Then it was off to DU CT's to clean the birds. In all we got 5 woodies (3 drakes and 2 hens) 10 geese (5 locally banded) and two pigeons (just decided to shoot them while goose hunting). FYI tomorrow i'm going to feed my wife the pigeons and tell her it's duck!!!

All in all another amazing hunt with a great group of guys who put a lot of hard work and effort into making these hunts most enjoyable and successful. Guys I can't thank you enough for letting me join you and I look forward to the adventures again in the future.

I think bishop does a nice job pointing it out but for those of you less familiar with waterfowl hunting what these guys did is no easy task! Good thing woodies are early risers, seems like around here you better be in the blind with dekes out by no later than 8 because honkers sure are punctual. Keep stacking.